The San Francisco district attorney's office is expected to drop more than 40 cases today as a result of its ongoing police misconduct investigation.

"It may be even more," said one source close to the review.

District Attorney George Gascón- who was police chief when some of the questionable searches involving the undercover officers occurred - is expected to ask that the cases be dismissed.

The cases involve the eight police officers under investigation for misconduct and perjury for their roles in a number of drug busts at residential hotels. Public Defender Jeff Adachi last week released several videos he says shows the officers illegally busting into apartments without warrants or properly identifying themselves. He says the officers lied on police reports to make the searches appear legal.

The matter is being investigated by the district attorney's office, the FBI and the Police Department's internal affairs unit.

In fact, of the 30 highest-paid employees on the list, seven work for the nonprofit Washington Hospital and earn between $319,427 and $397,361 a year.

Washington Hospital spokesman Chris Brownsaid Farber's pay was "based on what other like facilities pay their CEOs" and that the pay packages "were totally open" to public disclosure.

Maybe. But Lee Domanico, who heads the Marin Healthcare District and was hired to manage the takeover of the 235-bed Marin General hospital, was the next hospital CEO on the list. He was paid $581,836.

Both the Fremont and Marin hospitals are run by special districts, which do not receive taxpayer dollars and pay much better than county institutions.

Nobody at SCN wants to talk for the record, but we're told the consultants believed businesswoman Rees simply wasn't raising the kind of money needed to stay viable, nor did she commit to spending any of her personal fortune to make it happen.

Rees is a political neophyte who made a fortune in business, and had been hoping to make her mark in a crowded mayoral field as the only woman in the race.

Former Supervisor Michela Alioto-Pier's decision to enter the race, however, may have taken some of the thunder from Rees' bid.

Not so, said Rees, who claims her campaign is simply shifting gears: "This is now an on-the-ground, walking-the-neighborhood, field-based operation," she said. "And I feel great because SCN got me to a phenomenal point."

Pssss: BART appears on track to report yet another fiscal surplus for the coming year.

The news comes as BART directors are poised to part ways with General Manager Dorothy Dugger over a laundry list of perceived personal slights and failure to adequately communicate with them.